She was the wife and literary executor of Canadian novelist Robertson Davies.
Mathews was born in Melbourne, and met Davies at the University of Oxford.
[4] Her influence on Davies extended to persuading him to begin writing novels after some success as a playwright and to become principal of Massey College.
[4] After Davies' death in 1995, she and one of their daughters, Jennifer Surridge, became literary executors for his estate, and formed the company Pendragon Ink for this purpose.
She was the sister of Maisie Purves Smith, who became the second wife of the painter Sir Russell Drysdale.